Ron Gitter

No, this inspector is not checking out avocados. (Flickr photo by nikkigomez)

I don’t often waste my breath advocating a professional home inspection here in Manhattan.

That’s the opposite of what I did with each one of my clients in Washington, D.C., Virginia and Maryland.

Yet the benefits of an inspection are no smaller here than elsewhere, even though the vast majority of properties is sold “as is.” Not once in the D.C. area did the professionals fail to discover defects, suggest things to monitor and provide maintenance advice.

Brokerage firms are getting into the digital game themselves, creating a “virtual office Web site” or VOW.

These are sites operated by brokers that enable clients to search for most of the available properties in a particular market, not just the firm’s exclusive listings, according to the New York Times.

While brokers have mixed feelings about whether these sites are worth the investment, the emergence of the VOW is yet another sign that once tightly guarded listing information has finally been set free in New York.

Dollar value of citywide sales climbs from Q1 to Q2 as seasons change, but sales activity slips 4 percent below one year earlier

“A couple dozen of our buildings may be looking at the issue,” says Dan Wurtzel, president of Cooper Square Realty, which manages 400 properties.

Once a co-op board decides to consider a flip tax, there seems to be broad agreement about what type to institute. “Two percent of the total sales price of an apartment seems to be the number that everybody likes,” according to property manager Gerard J. Picaso.

An Upper East Side mansion that went begging for 7 years finds a buyer at last

Renting out your apartment entails pitfalls that can be avoided by knowing them.

Once you rent out your apartment, you create a “landlord-tenant” relationship with your renter.

That relationship is governed by a set of very specific (and technical) laws enacted by New York State and New York City, notes blogger and real estate lawyer Ron Gitter, who is a friend of mine.

Those laws tend to favor your tenant, but the “Landlord-Tenant Part” of the Civil Court of New York City does offer a judicial forum, albeit not necessarily a speedy one, for resolving issues that can’t be settled by mutual agreement between the parties.